


Christmas Yet to Come

by residualaffection



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Christmas Fluff, Cliches Galore, Established Relationship, F/M, Family Fluff, Fluff and Smut, God Bless Us Everyone, I Don't Even Know, Kid Fic, Post-Canon, Sappy Ending, Smut, Supporting Cast Shows Up at the End, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Why Is This So Long?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-22
Updated: 2013-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-05 12:36:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1093947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/residualaffection/pseuds/residualaffection
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sif and Loki take their kids for a first ever Christmas on Midgard with Jane and Thor.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Christmas Yet to Come

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladylillianrose](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladylillianrose/gifts).



"We put fruit in a sock? That is what you have gotten my children so excited for?"

"Not _only_ fruit. The orange in the toe is one of Jane's family's traditions, but there are other things as well. Candy, small toys, things of that nature. And then the larger gifts beneath the tree."

Sif gave Thor a skeptical look, but finally took from him the bundle of long knit stockings. She pulled the top one taut, tracing the candy cane design, and then flipped it aside to look at the others. A snowman. A candle-lit tree. Reindeer. He watched as she scrutinized, heavy fingers fluttering once like he might reach out, but he pushed them into his pockets instead.

"Those were knitted by Jane's grandmother," he said, a pleading note in his voice, like he feared she might suddenly light them on fire or tear them to bits with her nails, "Please be careful with them." Sif looked up sharply, lips pursing with ready retort. She had already been warned to be careful of the dining room chairs, the refrigerator door, a candelabra, and her niece's ears, all in the space of a day, and her teeth ground at the notion that Thor really believed her so incapable of taking responsible care of things.

But she caught the look in her friend's eye, the earnestness of his concern and the weariness etched across his brow, and she let the flare of temper ease away. "I will," she promised, leaning over to set a hand on the prince's shoulder and give it a reassuring squeeze. "It's very kind of her to include us this way. I will make sure her grandmother's stockings are returned undamaged."

Thor set his own big hand over hers and smiled. "Thank you."

They both paused a moment, hesitating, before Sif broke the silence: "It sounds odd, does it not? Grandm--"

"--mother's stockings?" Thor was already nodding, "To my ears it does. But the Midgardians do not seem to think it so and Jane did not appreciate when I attempted to explain the humour of it to her."

"I cannot imagine why." Sif flashed her old friend another warm smile and was pleased when he returned it, and with a thump to his biceps she took her leave.

 

* * *

 

Sif had shuddered a little to think what the mortals might mean by a 'cabin' when their supposed royal palaces were barely the size of a hunting lodge, but she had been pleasantly surprised. Though Jane's ancestral retreat was little more than a shed in size by Asgardian standards, in truth it held their two families more than comfortably. And as she lingered by a window, watching snow fill in tracks down the lawn and across the frozen lake, Sif conceded that she could see the appeal.

Not to mention that she could hardly complain the house was too small when she had managed to lose her husband in it.

"Loki?" Sif's call was half a whisper as she wound her way through the basement's back rooms, mindful of thin ceilings and the fussy sleepers finally napping in their bunk beds just above her head. She made her way around a tool bench, curiosity caught by the row of vicious-looking implements hung neatly on a pegboard, and then called again. "Loki, are you down here?"

Her response was a strange dry rustling sound, and what sounded like Loki's voice, but with the words muffled and cut off by half a pained groan. The sound sent the twin stimulants of fear and anticipation lancing down Sif's spine and quietly she snatched up the heaviest wrench on the wall and a pointed chisel, readying each in her grip as she crept towards the doorway. She heard something being dragged across the floor, and a weird tearing sound she couldn't place, and then blood rushing in her ears as she sprang around the corner, weapons raised.

Jane and Loki both looked up at her from where they sat, a pile of parcels and crumpled shiny paper between them. Loki had some sort of plastic contraption held between his teeth from which he drew a transparent strip, and Jane was drawing the blade of a scissors down a length of colorful, curling twine. She looked from Sif to Loki and back, confusion easily read in wide eyes and uncertain smile. "Hi Sif?"

Loki refused to relinquish his finger-hold on the half-secured bow but spat the tape dispenser onto the floor and arched his brows. "Is there a problem, Sif? I can see how one might call this a battle but I do not think those particular weapons are likely to aid you here."

"I thought--," Sif paused, uncertain what she had thought. Her concerns for their safety were mild and vague, these days, all true threats killed or imprisoned or vanished off into the ether. If she once in a while dreamt of slimy hands and purple faces and the tortured screams of her husband this was neither the time nor the place to mention it. So she shrugged and shook her head, setting aside her makeshift arms on a shelf. "I don't know," she said, "I heard strange noises, and you sounded like you were in pain…."

Jane laughed, and Loki shot them both a glare. "If I was in pain, it was caused by this absurdly inefficient process and these inferior materials." Jane snickered down at her bow and nodded along but couldn't quite manage convincing faux-solemnity, "Of course, I'm sure that was it." Sif's lips twitched against a smile and she picked her way across the room the drop to the floor beside him, arranging long legs close to her body and leaning over to look at his work.

"So this is how gifts are prepared here? Thor mentioned something of it. Wrapping." She wiggled fingers in the air as if this was some arcane foreign term and not a perfectly common word. "I had not realized it was so exacting an endeavour."

"It really doesn't need to be," Jane replied, at the same moment that Loki said, "Because you have no eye for aesthetic detail," and this time it was Sif that chuckled. She gave Loki a shove in the ribs and then sat back, exchanging a smile with Jane over his shoulder as she said, "Very well, teach me."

It proved to be a longer lecture than Sif had anticipated, but broken up by much demonstration and practice, and Jane chiming in with advice despite her insistence that she wasn't actually very good at it herself, either. "But I'm better at it than Thor," she said, and added almost in unison with Sif, "Not that that's difficult." Even Loki laughed, and Sif allowed herself to submit to a demonstration of why she was folding the corners all wrong.

Jane finished up, and Sif helped load her arms with piled up presents, promising she and Loki could manage the rest. "Good luck!" the scientist whispered over the top of the stack and Sif grinned, "I may need it!" She leaned out the door to make sure Jane made it past the hazards of the tool room without disaster before rejoining Loki on the floor.

He was fiddling with a ribbon, unsatisfied with its curl, and Sif leaned against his back and watched. "Loki," she finally said softly, tilting her head to rest her cheek against the top of his shoulder, "I think that's good enough. The children are only going to rip them off anyway." She could see his jaw clench, lips pursing in disagreement, no doubt readying some sour remark about her willingness to settle for less than the best, and she ran a hand down his chest, leaning in to nuzzle the back of his ear and graze the lobe with her teeth as she smiled. "Besides, it's your tape-work that is the true disaster. You should focus your energies there." He startled and sputtered once, turning back to see his wife biting her lip but utterly failing to hold in a cheeky smirk.

"Is that so?" the trickster replied, picking up a tape dispenser and lobbing it at Sif. "Let us see if you can do better, then." She caught it straight out of his hands and shrugged, "Let's." Sif walked on her knees to a more open section of floor, and dug into the bags that held the gifts they had brought, most for Ullr and Sigrún. She picked out the most uniform shape she could find, which proved to be a volume of elvish children's tales with heavy pages and huge illustrations Loki had chosen for their daughter, and set about unrolling paper beneath it. Loki watched as he fiddled with the tape on the box he was wrapping.

"You must fold the--." Sif held a hand up and shook her head without looking up, flapping her fingers at the floor in front of him, "See to your own, you are not about to distract me and gain a lead." Loki's eyes narrowed and his lips thinned but he reached out for the box before him (a set of half-blunted little throwing knives for Ullr) and set it squarely down in the center of the paper.

They wrapped in silence for a while, one gift each, two, and Sif began to feel she had gotten the hang of it. By the third she was speeding along and Loki's jaw was clenched in concentration as he cut and taped in a flurry. Sif snagged a skein of ribbon just before he reached at it, and grinned in the face of his surprised glare. The next time she went for the tape her hand went through it, and Loki made a show of dangling it carelessly from a fingertip just out of reach until Sif had to lean forward on her knees to take it back. She braced herself on Loki's shoulder for balance and he smirked until she pushed off and sent him rocking back into a bag full of bows. One stuck to the back of his shoulder and Sif whistled innocently, snatches of a tune Jane had had playing upstairs earlier.

Of course that made Loki suspicious and after he'd added another package to his stack he found the bow on his back, scraped it off and threw it at Sif. She batted it out of the air with a smile and flung it back, and then a mess of ribbon after it. Loki stole the scissors almost out of her hand and found a crumpled up ball of paper bouncing off his chest. As she ducked her head to try to somehow square off the corners around a stuffed toy, Sif found a hail of little bits of paper peppering her, settling in dark hair and pinging off her forehead. "Cheat!" she laughed as she looked up to find them flying through the air in a pale green haze while Loki applied tape down the centerline of yet another present. "What?" he replied, eyes wide and innocent.

"You are a terrible cheat, using magic!" Sif flapped a hand to clear the cloud of paper flakes out of her face and reached over to rake her nails through the paper he'd just finished sticking down, clawing it right off the package. "Fiend!" Loki's laugh was shock and outrage and he caught her by the arm, tumbling her over half into his lap. SIf shoved the gift out from beneath her and ended up with a bow stuck to her hand, which she slapped on Loki's forehead before righting herself, scrabbling for the tape.

They wrestled for it, and then the paper and anything else in reach, Sif grabbing at things and tossing them to her side of the room while Loki swept an arm out to reclaim what he could and sweep it out of her reach. They were soon a tangle of arms and then legs as well, elbows in ribs cutting off laughter but never for long. Sif shoved Loki down to fling a packet of labels over his head, only to be caught around the neck and held down in turn while he stuffed crumpled scraps of paper down the back of her sweater.

"You are going to-- pay! for that!" she laughed, squirming to shake them out onto the floor and pinching his chest, getting knuckles around a nipple through the crisp cloth of his shirt. Loki yelped and retaliated with a smack to her ass that sharpened Sif's laughter for a second. "You'll pay for that, too," she promised with teeth nipping at his neck. A flicker of tongue up toward his his earlobe and Sif's breath caught when Loki's hand squeezed, drawing her tight against him. She untucked his shirt and slid a hand beneath, stroking the lean planes of his abdomen while struggling with the row of tiny buttons down the front. "Midgardian clothing is nearly as inconvenient as our own," she grumbled, and Loki chuckled and caught her mouth with his, one hand sliding down the back of her jeans.

"In some respects," he agreed, his other hand drawing hers down to the crotch of his dark jeans, setting it over the bulge there. She traced the outline of his cock as it stiffened, rubbing her palm over the hardening line of him, teasing until his erection tented the material, strained against the tight fit.

"They don't look very comfortable," she remarked, scratching lightly with blunt nails at the cloth pulled taut over the head and just beneath.

Loki held in a gasp and bared his teeth in a wolfish little smile. "I find some aspects of their design quite useful, in fact." He set his hand over hers and gave another squeeze before moving her fingers to his fly. Sif chuckled and gave him a last stroke through the denim before drawing the zipper down and wiggling fingers inside.

"Disinclined to take Thor's advice on underthings, I see," she said, finding only warming skin beneath. She slid her fingertips along his length, down to his balls and back again. "I thought they were rather appealing on you, but there's much to be said for easy access." Loki murmured his agreement and Sif leaned up to kiss him as she undid the button at his waist, wrapped her fist around his cock, and pulled. He groaned his approval into her mouth and she lapped it up, moving to straddle his thigh. He pulled her flush, until he could feel the heat of her through both their pants when Sif rolled her hips to grind against him.

"They do have their points," she agreed somewhat belatedly, close enough for lips to brush his as she spoke. Her hand worked a leisurely pace between them and her hips rocked gently, but her voice had started to go a little thin to match the way his dropped deeper into his chest in times like these. It sounded like she meant to go on but distraction let her sentence trail off with a soft huff of a breath against his neck.

"Oh?" Loki prompted.

She brushed her lips just above his collar. "There is this-- seam. Or maybe two, I have not really looked, but there is this little… bundle of material and when I lean against you," Sif tilted her hips forward in demonstration and Loki could hear her breath catch before teeth scraped his jaw, "When I do that it rubs in precisely the right spot." She gave his shaft a couple quick, twisting pumps as she worked herself against him, pressed so tightly to his thigh she could feel when the flexed the muscle and Loki swore she would soon soak him to the skin. Sif dragged her mouth across his cheek and down his throat, sucking hard just above his collar, and shuddered as he bucked into her hand, pushing his hip against her.

"Ought I be jealous?" Loki teased, "You seem to be quite enjoying yourself without me." Sif stroked circles around his tip until his breath caught and rushed out in a moan, then brought the glistening pad of her thumb to her mouth and licked it clean before biting her knuckle around a grin.

"Definitely."

She joked but Loki pulled the buttons of her jeans unfastened with one hard tug and pushed his hand inside, long fingers slipping along slick skin, skimming over her clit, even that grazing touch already enough to make her gasp. Sif wriggled her pants lower, interrupted by the need to press closer as he sunk two fingers into the tight heat of her. She held his erection forgotten in her grip as she ground down against Loki's palm, eyes slipping closed with a groan as she rode his hand, "I take it back."

Before they'd left Asgard that morning it had been Yuletide at court and they had spent event after event trapped on dais after dais with hardly a moment to themselves.They'd managed to steal a few kisses here and there, a quick grope once on a balcony but there was always a meeting or a ceremony or a delegation or a crisis and when there were not there was storytime and lessons and bad dreams and the end result was that Sif had been aching for him and even fingers as clever as Loki's weren't enough. It still seemed a little ridiculous to say, "I've missed you," after a mere week or two and when they'd been side by side all day but she didn't care and Loki just mouthed his agreement against the top of her breast and thrust into the loose circle of her fingers as he scissored his own inside her. "Now," Sif demanded, pulling his head up to crush a kiss to his lips. Her jeans were only open and boots still on and even the mere moments spent attempting to wrestle them off quickly felt like too long. Sif gave up and turned over onto hands and knees, reaching back to help/hurry Loki lining up behind her when all of a sudden a wail came from upstairs and they both froze.

Their breathing sounded loud and crazed in the abrupt silence, shallow, excited pants that Sif forced back under control with a deep, deliberate breath. Loki didn't say a word but looked stricken when she twisted to meet his eyes, and Sif wished he knew any spells that could get them just a few minutes more. It wouldn't take longer than that, not with the tension already coiled and pulsing in her belly and the way his cock was dripping against the inside of her thigh. "Go back to sleep," she prayed beneath her breath. "Go back to sleep, please go back to sleep, please, please go back to sleep-- thrice damned--!!" She slapped the concrete with the flat of her palm as the cry upstairs returned and rose into full on sobbing. With a heave of a sigh she pulled away, flopping onto her back with a long, frustrated groan to wriggle back into her jeans. Loki sat back on his haunches, rubbing a hand over his jaw to partially obscure the hungry way he licked his lips as he watched his wife dress.

"It seems we are to have no better luck here than we had at court," he said, voice still thick and low with want, but shadowed with frustration curling into anger, "Had we gone to Gladsheim as I suggested--."

Sif quelled the renewal of that argument with a sharp look as she finished doing up her pants and ruffled a hand through her hair.

"Don't spoil the mood any further," she said, leaning over to press a kiss to his cheek. "We'll find time." With another sigh she eased to her feet as Loki pressed his lips together but remained silent. "I'll see to the children, you finish the wrapping." He nodded, and she made it two steps out the door before turning around to lean back in. She pointed a finger not just at Loki but his erection in particular, which his hand just happened to have wrapped around the moment she was out of sight. He had the good grace to look a little sheepish but didn't release his grip. "If you finish that without me I will be angry. If I must wait so must you." Sif didn't stay to watch him peel his fingers free and gingerly tuck his cock back into his pants but she knew from the frustrated groan that followed her out that she wouldn't be alone in finding the walk up the stairs uncomfortable to say the least.

 

* * *

 

Sigrún's crying hadn't bothered Ullr and Fríða much, the older children drifting back off once Sif had carried her youngest from the room. But little Jón had begun fussing straight away and soon Thor was slipping out after Sif with the baby on his shoulder. He stepped up beside her at the window where she stood with her daughter sat in the curve of an arm, bouncing her gently. Sif spoke quiet words into her ear, stroking dark curls as the little girl's hiccupy sobs slowed. Even as softly as he spoke to his son Thor's voice still rumbled and Sigrún turned her head to look, eyes wide and tearful. "It's just Uncle Thor," Sif told her quietly, "And your little cousin Jón. Do you want to say hello? No?" Sif chuckled as she buried her face against her mother's shoulder. "Very well. Maybe later." Sif shot Thor a smile and shook her head when he gestured at the door, offering to leave. "No, no, we're fine. It was just a bad dream. Please."

For a few minutes they both rocked in place, watching the snow fall outside as their children cried themselves out against their chests. Sif reached over to stroke one of Jón's little fists where it beat against his father's shoulder. "He'll be swinging Mjolnir in no time," she said, and Thor grinned.

"He's a strong lad already," he agreed, and then winced and laughed as the baby screeched, "And I do not just mean his lungs. But those too."

Sif chuckled and shushed Sigrún quietly with lips against her temple as she watched Thor. He never looked bigger than with his tiny son in the crook of his arm, gently stroking Jón's little blond head as he hummed a melody. He glanced up and looked a little self-conscious to find her watching and Sif smiled warmly. "I didn't mean to stare," she apologized, leaning over to bump her shoulder to his. "You're so sweet with him." Thor chuckled and bumped her back and Sigrún whined at the jostling. Sif leaned away and held her tighter, rocking heel to toe and still watching Thor out the corner of her eye as he did the same. "Not so long ago I would have laughed for an hour had any foreseen this for us," she said, "Babes instead of blades?"

He grinned and nodded. "I should have said we would never get so soft."

"And in that you were right," Sif added, and they shared another smile.

Just a few weeks ago they had been side by side in the fray as always, battling Doom's forces, armor coated in blood and dirt and oil, a host of fallen foes littering the ground around them. And now here they were side by side again in a wholly different endeavour.

Thor took up humming an old drinking song, and Sif joined in and the pair sang bawdy lyrics beneath their breath until both Sigrún and Jón were finally sound asleep again. They crept back into the room and laid them in their beds, carefully maneuvering around each other in the small space to tuck them in. Sif patted Thor on the back and he draped an arm over her shoulder as they left their children to rest and slipped back out together.

 

* * *

 

The fresh coat of snow that had been slowly accumulating all morning was circled with tracks from boots big and small, messily winged shapes, and a pair of snow Einherjar with carrot noses and stick swords, the base of a third abandoned beside them. On the lake a large circle of ice had been swept clean and Sigrún and Fríða giggled as their fathers ran, Thor's feet pounding on thick ice while Loki skipped light-footed across it, both of them dragging their daughters behind on sleds. Sif sat nearby with Jane and Jón, while Ullr worked on digging out a snowdrift into an elaborate fort.

"Is that a good idea?" Jane wondered, tipping her chin towards the race when Sif raised a brow in question, "Letting them get competitive? You remember Yule last year, with the logs."

"It really isn't," Sif agreed, "But they always find some way, don't they? At least with this the girls will keep them in line."

Jane nodded. "That's true." After a moment she turned to Sif and smiled, "I'm glad you guys were able to come."

Sif's own smile widened, and she glanced away from her husband making a somewhat precarious u-turn to fix Jane with a warm look. "I am pleased as well, and apologize for descending upon you so suddenly on the eve of the holiday. I know we are not an easy group to accommodate."

"Oh, no, don't worry about it," Jane was quick to shake her head and flap a hand at Sif, "There's plenty of room and it's nice to have the house full." Her smile tilted into self-deprecation and her tone shifted to match as she said, "I'm sure that's why Thor twisted your arm about coming."

"No, he didn't--."

"It's alright," Jane cut Sif off, "Even if he didn't I think he would've. It's…."

Sif reached over to tickle Jón's hand through his mitten, giving Jane a moment to collect her thoughts. The little boy smiled and gurgled, batting at her hand, and the warrior wiped a dribble of drool off his chin before it could freeze.

"I'm not sure if Thor mentioned it, but my mother passed away last spring. So this is the first Christmas… and my brother and his family weren't able to make it, and I think Thor--." Jane's smile was fond, and she ducked her head to fuss with straightening the baby's beanie, "I think Thor just wants everything to be perfect this year. I think he was worried the house would feel...empty with just us."

"I am not sure I can imagine any house with Thor in it ever feeling empty," Sif couldn't resist deadpanning, and Jane laughed a little before the Asgardian went on, "But I think I understand. Your family has been coming here for Christmas celebrations for many years, Thor said? It is strange," she brushed her ponytail back over her shoulder as the wind caught it, gloved hand catching in her collar for a moment, cold leather tucked against her throat. "To have so many things the same as they have always been and yet… someone missing."

Jane nodded, and then again, chin bobbing shallowly. "Yeah," she said, "Yeah, it really is. I'd sort of forgotten-- when my parents got divorced a million years ago and my dad left it was kinda like this. There are things you associate with them and then when you go to do those things without them…." She trailed off and shrugged.

Sif drew up a knee and propped her chin on her fist, looking back across to the lake where her husband was throwing up a hand in seeming disgust while Thor laughed and lifted Sigrún up to rub snow into her father's dark hair.

"When Frigga was killed," she said, "It was like that. Yule that year was-- it felt wrong to celebrate without her. She had always been as near to a mother as could be, for me. Though I could not be precisely the sort of lady she was, and could never have been a queen as she was, from when I was very small she seemed always to understand me where others did not, where my own mother-- when no one did. I wonder sometimes if she did not read the thread of my life in her weaving before I knew myself." The fur about her shoulders shed a light coating of snow as she lifted her shoulders and dropped them again. "No matter how many torches were lit that year every feast hall seemed dimmer and meaner without her. They do still."

She turned back to Jane then and pressed out a smile, snorting softly at herself, "But I am sorry, I did not mean to twist your conversation to myself. She would chide me for that, no doubt. I only mean to say that I think I understand a little." She reached over to set a hand on Jane's arm, hazel eyes bright with the faint skim of tears, but warmly earnest despite the snowflakes melting in her hair and eyelashes. "I am truly sorry for your loss, Jane. I hope that all of us here can distract you some for the holiday, but if it is an imposition and you would prefer a quiet home I hope that you will tell me. And if there is anything else that I might do, please never hesitate to ask."

"It's great to have you all here, really," Jane assured her, and Sif looked carefully for a moment before accepting the sentiment as genuine. They both sat in silence for a moment, Sif looking over her shoulder at Ullr's progress as she blinked her gaze clear again.

"I am sorry not to have known her better," Jane said, "At least my mother knew her grandchildren."

"I recall meeting her at your wedding, she was a lovely woman. She and the queen would have gotten on, I think."

Jane laughed softly, "I agree, from what Thor's told me about her. She-- my mom was fascinated by Asgard. Married to an _alien prince_. I don't think any mother's ever been so proud. She came with me when Fríða was born there. She spent half the time interrogating Eir about Asgard's hygienic precautions and germ theory."

Sif chuckled with her. "My own mother seemed more likely to require the attention of healers than did I, she had worked her nerves to such a frenzy the months before." She paused a moment and added, a little dry, a little wondering, "Though that is not entirely fair. She found her head when I thought I might lose mine, when the time finally came. She made certain everything was prepared, bullied some poor guard into fetching Loki for me all the way from Niflheim. I always felt Frigga and I were closer. We were. That she was not able to see any of this is…. But I ought to speak more kindly than I do of my own mother."

"You have time." Jane smiled tightly and Sif dropped a guilty look to her hands.

"Again I ought to beg your pardon," she said, watching the other woman brush snow off Jón's face as he ate a tiny fistful, prying some out with a finger before he managed to give himself brainfreeze, "There is good reason I am no diplomat. If it cannot be solved with a blade or a fist I have my hands over-full."

"We both know that isn't really true," Jane said, casting a look Sif's way with a tilt of her head. She tugged a mitten straight and hauled the baby up onto her thigh to bounce him idly. "My mom and I had our differences. She always thought my work had gotten too theoretical, that I should be doing something more concrete. Every holiday would be an argument about how I was wasting my talents, I could be _helping people_!" She tossed a hand in the air, "Like trying to unlock the universe wouldn't help anyone?"

"Surely she was swayed after your discoveries in New Mexico? Or at least New York? I understand that is when the general public became aware of… us."

Jane nodded, "Yeah, after that she finally started to get it. It was nice. I felt like we finally really connected on that level, like she actually cared about my work. Things were really-- we were really good." She sniffed once, and then again, harder, and Sif set her hand on the back of her shoulder, squeezing once in silence.

Jane pulled off a glove to blot at her eyes, sniffing again and giving her head a bit of a shake. "I'm alright. I'm-- shhhhhh shhh shh shhh, I'm alright, sweetie," she said, gathering Jón up as the little boy whimpered. She looked back to Sif, "I should take him in but actually there is something you might help me with."

"You need only name it."

"We used to always make these huge batches of ginger cookies to give to the neighbors-- and just to eat ourselves-- and I'm way behind on getting them done." Sif's teeth found the inside of her lip and Jane chuckled, "Don't worry, the dough's already in the fridge, I don't need you to actually make them. I just need to get them rolled out and cut out and the kids can help with some but I really need a half dozen or so really solid batches and I could use an extra set of hands. Adult hands."

Sif looked at her hands, turning them over as if unsure that they qualified, but smiled. "I will do my best."

"Great. I'll get them started in a little while, I'll let you know."

"I shall await your summons." Sif clapped a fist to her heart in joking salute and Jane headed inside with a smile.

She brushed snow off her shoulders and sat up a little straighter, twisting at the waist to take in her family spread across the lawn and the frozen lake at its edge. Thor and Loki had apparently elected to decide their differences with a rematch, and raced towards the shore with Sigrún and Fríða laughing in their wake. Sif pushed to her feet and headed towards the makeshift igloo some yards away, crouching to peer in through the tunnel entrance in search of her oldest. "Ullr? Have you fallen asleep and frozen solid in there? Or become an ice bear?"

"No, mama," the little boy within said very seriously, "I am working."

Safely out of his sight Sif let her smile curve wide, listening to the sounds of careful scraping and packing of snow. "May I come in?"

She bit her lip to hold in a grin at the moment of silent contemplation before he replied, "Yes. But be careful not to knock down the tunnel."

"I will, I promise." Sif resisted the urge to feign affront - the brief entrance tunnel was easily wide enough for two of her - but she supposed to children even the slenderest adults must seem giant. She tipped forward onto her elbows and crawled carefully into the fort, just far enough to get her head into the main room.

It was surprisingly large on the inside, a domed ceiling over a space wide enough that she might have comfortably sat cross-legged if she ducked her head a bit. Ullr was perched in one corner, painstakingly shaving snow off one surface, smoothing the juncture of wall and ceiling. Sif slid in a little further, reaching out to brush snow off his bent knee. "This is very impressive, Ullr," she said, quite seriously before she teased, "It doesn't look half this big from the outside. Perhaps we should give up your bed in the cabin to some other child and you can live out here."

"Can I?" Big green eyes lit up, and Sif chuckled, reaching up to ruffle his hair. "I was only joking. I think you would get awfully cold before too long, and it is not even dark yet."

"But what if father magicked it?" Ullr asked, his enthusiasm for the idea not yet dampened, "He could make it warm, and keep the bears away, couldn't he? He told me the story about when you and he were in Niflheim and he built a snow cave and you lived in it for a whole week!"

Sif found herself caught momentarily off-guard, and then laughed, and shook her head, "That was only because we were trapped by a terrible storm and a whole pack of vicious snow spirits." Even so, Sif could see her son's brain working behind his eyes, dreaming up a night of adventure in his own personal ice palace. If she didn't work quickly he'd become attached to the idea and once he'd latched on Ullr could be utterly intractable and tantrums often followed. (Which of his parents he'd acquired that trait from was the subject of on-going debate.) "I'm sure he could help, but we are on the eve of Christmas, remember? Your Aunt Jane has told me that Santa Claus will come down the chimney to bring presents to all the children in the house and leave them in the stockings on the hearth. If you are not in the house with the rest of us, he might not leave you any gifts."

Ullr's brow crinkled beneath a flop of dark hair and Sif reached up to push it out of his eyes, making a mental note to see it cut when they returned home. "Mamaaaa," he complained, pushing his own hand through his hair as he considered what she'd said. "Why can't Santa Claus bring my presents here?" he asked, "I could build a hearth and a chimney!"

"But if he were to land his sleigh on the roof the reindeer would break right through," Sif pointed out, "And you would not want to get trampled by a herd of reindeer, would you?" She gave his cloak a straightening tug and his cheek and chin a stroke with gloved knuckles until he squirmed and she grinned. "Come in and sleep with your sister and your cousins in the house tonight," she said, "And tomorrow we will talk to your father and work on a fort you can camp in, all right?"

"All right," Ullr agreed, and a big gap-toothed smile split his face. "Maybe father and uncle Thor can help me build a stable for the reindeer!"

Sif smiled back. "Maybe so, you'll have to-- hey!" She turned to peer back over her shoulder as something landed on the back of her leg. A giggle followed the impact, and then another cold splat against the back of her thigh. "What's going on out there?" she called, slithering backwards out. Her progress was greeted by a barrage of snowballs and high-pitched laughter supported by deeper chuckling. They pattered against her side and shoulder as she sat up, one arm raised in defense, "Who dares attack the mighty Lady Sif?" she demanded, and Fríða shouted, "We do!" before lobbing another snowball at her while Loki helped Sigrún pitch one at her mother's feet. Behind them Thor packed snow into loose spheres and stacked them in a pyramid, tossing a couple in high arcs to burst against Sif's back.

"Oh no!" Sif cried in mock horror, balling up a snowball of her own, a careful toss landing it on the girl's boots, "Not you! I shall never win if the dread Fríða Thorsdottir is against me! I shall have to--" one landed squarely on the side of her face and another the center of her chest and Sif startled and laughed, brushing snow off her cheek as Loki and Thor shrugged at her with looks that were entirely too innocent. "I shall have to flee!" Sif finished to Fríða's delight, and ducked to crawl back into the fort, making a point to drag out her escape, twitching as it mortally wounded by each snowball's strike on her legs as she retreated.

"Ullr!" she cried, making a show of crawling towards the boy, pulling him from his work and grasping at him with tickling fingers until he wriggled and laughed, "Mama stoooop!"

"My son, my only darling son, you must help me! I am under attack by terrible ruffians! I fear I am done for! You must avenge me!"

"I will do it, Mama!" Ullr promised, immediately game, "I'll sneak out the escape tunnel and surprise them! I'm the best at snowballs, father showed me a secret."

"I am counting on you, Ullr. Aveeennggeee meeeee," Sif said, all dramatic tones and sadly flopping arms as she watched him crawl out through the back way. After a moment she picked her head up and shouted after him, "No rocks, Ullr! And no iceballs! Do you hear me? Ullr! No ice! What--?"

She twisted to look and found Loki crawling into the fort behind her, squeezing through the tunnel along with her legs. She scraped up a handful of snow and lobbed it at him, making Loki splutter and brush at his face when the loosely packed orb exploded on his forehead. The second time he laughed, "Woman! If you do that once more--."

Sif smirked, but nudged him in the chest with her knee, "If you collapse that passage Ullr is going to be terribly disappointed."

"Then stop harrying me," he replied. He elbowed her in the thigh and then hauled himself the rest of the way in. Rather than ask his purpose, Sif immediately rubbed another handful of snow into his crown. "Did you tell Ullr about the time we were trapped in a snow cave on Niflheim?"

"Sif!" Loki grumbled and rubbed at his head, combing his hair straight again with his fingers. "I may have. What of it?"

"First off, he seems to be under the impression that you built our sanctuary entirely on your own, when I seem to recall doing a great deal of shoveling myself."

"Wellllll…."

Sif came at him with another handful of snow and Loki laughed, batting at her hand and conceding as he wrestled her arm away, "Very well, you may have assisted."

"May!" Sif harrumphed and continued with abating, stretching for another handful of snow as she grappled for a hold on his collar. "And second," Loki's arm found her stomach and her breath left her in a visible puff of laughter. "Second! Second, please tell me that you said nothing to him of how we ended up _spending_ that week."

Loki squirmed out of Sif's grasp and shoved her head sideways, rubbing it into the snowy floor. "Why not?" he teased, "I should think you would remember that time quite fondly. I know I would, if I could ever get the ringing of your cries out of my ears." He lifted pale fingers to tug at one like it bothered him still, and Sif shoved a handful of snow up his other sleeve.

"Pleasant as those memories are it is much too soon to have to explain what it means that we made him then," she said, watching Loki flap his arm to clear it, dropping the bits of snow back onto her head before he spread long arms and drew Sif tight against him.

"I said nothing, of course. Nor will I tell him how we spent our time in this fort."

"Grappling like children?"

"That is not quite what I had in mind." Loki showed her his teeth and Sif felt his hand sneak between her sweater and jeans. She shivered, his touch was cold but he at least was not carrying any snow, thankfully.

"Loki." She made his name a protest even as his hand turned so he could slide fingertips down her belly and her hips pushed traitorously nearer.

"Mmm?"

"We have started enough things we could not finish of late, don't you think?" She tilted her head to nip at his jaw and he turned his to bring their mouths together. His lips were as cold as his hand but she made quick work of both with a deep kiss and the heat even a suggestion of his touch quickly rekindled between her thighs.

"We keep doing this," she complained when they drew back for breath. She reached between them to take his wrist and drag his hand back out of her pants, ignoring Loki's noise of objection and her own reluctance as she brushed lips across his cheek, nibbling at the corner of his mouth, the underside of his chin. "In a moment we would be discovered or called apart and I will once again be left," she trailed kisses towards his ear between words, each emphasized with a flick of her tongue, punctuated with a graze of her teeth, "Aching. Dripping. Wanting you. I can think of nothing else but how I miss you," she breathed, words soft and low against the shell of his ear, sending a shiver down his spine they both felt in the twitch of his hips against hers, "How you fit inside me. Your clever silver tongue." Her breath shuddered on the exhale. "If I do not have you soon I may go mad." Teeth caught and dragged on his earlobe as she leaned away.

And then abruptly released to push space between them, bringing her thighs together with a groan and lifting a hand to cover her face, rubbing at a cheek where red streaked across the bone.

"And now we've done it again anyway. But _this_ is _not_ the place to fix it. So I am going to go make sure that Thor has his eye on the children and then head inside and seek a hot shower to unfreeze my hair and if you value your life you will sneak in to join me shortly."

"You did that entirely to yourself and I have no sympathy," Loki replied as he fell back and propped himself on an elbow, letting out a deep breath in something between a sigh and a chuckle, "You have no idea how often I have been forced to use illusion to maintain any public decency whatsoever." His eyes were meltwater pale as he slid a heated gaze down her form. Sif's answering appraisal as she backed out of the fort made it only so far as his crotch and she stopped on her way to lean forward and press a kiss to the denim where it strained over his arousal. Loki laughed and groaned at once and ruffled snow into her hair. "Go! Get on with you, you cruel creature. Leave me be to die in peace a moment before I follow."

"As you wish."

She started to walk away but only made it a step or two before she crouched and bent to look back into the tunnel, slapping Loki's heel to get his attention. "The secret to snowball-making you taught Ullr didn't happen to involve putting ice in the center, did it? Because I seem to remember a certain winter…."

"No?" Loki twisted around to see her, shaking his head, "No, of course not. He was upset he couldn't get them round enough, so I taught him a spell to help, that's all." He kicked back at her, "As if I would risk that with Sigrún about? Come, Sif."

"I know, I am sorry," she said, giving his ankle a squeeze, "I didn't think it likely, but it was just something in the way he said it, I felt I ought to double-check." She gave his leg another pat and said, "I will see you soon?"

"Very," Loki confirmed, bumping his foot against hers. He smiled, and she pushed back to a stand and headed off.

 

* * *

 

The bathroom was already clouded with steam when Loki entered, fog wafting out when he opened the door to slip inside. He spent a moment searching for a dry surface to set his clothes on but gave up when Sif stuck her head out. "Are you _ever_ coming?"

"So impatient," he chided, but set his things down on the counter and slid the curtain back to step into the near-scalding spray. Sif's preference for near boiling herself alive in the bath was not one Loki had ever shared, but just at the moment he did not mind so very much. The moment he entered Sif pressed herself close, twining arms around his neck and taking a kiss. Snow and ice were washed from his hair, a chilly spill down his shoulders that had Sif drawing back with a shiver. She was flushed all over, pale cheeks gone ruddy in the heat, dark hair combed down her back. He was still a moment in admiration, which only grew when she rolled her eyes and groaned, reaching for his arm.

"You know that I appreciate your...appreciation…but can you not gaze at me afterwards?"

"Truly I have found myself the most demanding and ungrateful lady in the realms," Loki complained, though he crossed the tub's short length to join her, hands settling on the shallow curve of her hips.

"It is only fair, you being a most demanding and ungrateful sort of man yourself," Sif replied. She set both palms on his chest, thumbs stroking the slopes and planes of lean muscle there.

"I, demanding? I think it could be said that I have exercised remarkable restraint of late." As if in demonstration his hands remained precisely where they were, grip light, while Sif's mapped his torso in restless caress.

"Only in certain respects. And then entirely too much restraint, I should say. In this of all things! Perhaps I should have called you perverse, instead. Contrary. Utterly infuriating? A complete--!"

Sif broke off with a laugh as Loki surged forward a pace, putting her back to the tiled wall with a thud. "Finally," she breathed against his lips just before they were crushed against hers, but when she lifted a leg to hitch around his hips Loki pushed it away. Sif made a sound of confused complaint into his mouth and pushed closer until she felt him pressed hard against her belly, trapped between their bodies. "Loki…."

"Sif," he replied, head lowered to press a line of kisses down her neck, each with more bite than the last. He slowed when she spoke, working one spot just at the hollow of her throat with enraging thoroughness. Sif dragged nails down his neck in protest but couldn't quite bring herself to bid him stop, not when the stroke of his tongue across skin made sensitive by teeth sent heat spiking down her spine. She tilted back her head to rest against the wall and closed her fingers in the hair at Loki's nape, too-long and curling in the damp. As soon as she ceased to protest his mouth slid lower, dragged down the centerline of her chest with barely a detour to tease nipples harder before he was tonguing at her navel. She laughed and squirmed as she always did, smacking at the back of his shoulder. "Stop that!"

Smoothly easing to his knees Loki shot her an innocent look, open mouth pressed to her belly and trailing ever so slowly lower. Sif groaned and he all but stopped, teasing at the ridge of her hipbone. "Oh, this game," her chuckle was soft and a little husky, "This is the cruelest of your games, I think."

"It is hardly my fault that you are so very bad at it." Loki blew lightly across the mark blooming on her skin and Sif shivered and laughed again,

"It is _entirely_ your fault that I am so bad at it. Must we play today?"

"Why lady, that was dangerously near a compliment."

"You shall find yourself dangerously near something else entirely in a moment."

He grinned, a slender, toothy thing as he slid a hand up the back of her leg and down again, drawing it onto his shoulder. Lest she be too pleased by the progress he also leaned back to begin at her knee, nuzzling the soft skin just inside the joint before pressing a line of lazy kisses up her thigh. Sif longed to hurry him, envisioned grabbing the back of his head and closing her legs around it, holding him in place until he gave up his teasing. But she held still, enduring brushes of his lips so light they tickled and sent goose bumps racing despite the heat of the room. She pressed a fist to her hip but did not complain, and was finally rewarded with his breath between her legs, a cool puff of air across overheated skin and then his mouth close behind.

Loki was more than capable of teasing her for an hour and at that first feather touch of his lips Sif feared he had taken it into his head to do so today, that he might keep her here, poised on her toes and at his mercy until she was a trembling mess gasping and begging him for an end. He had a particular fondness for doing so just before court events or social gatherings so she sat at his side upon the throne or at table in half a daze, pleasure still humming through her. (She found a way to repay him in kind every time but somehow [ _somehow_ ] it had not put him off.)

Perhaps he had intended to do the same today, but his own long-delayed desire got the better of him and at the first taste of her any plan to draw things out was abandoned. Instead he put all his considerable skills to use with a suddenness that stole Sif's breath and had her lifting off the ground, settling both legs over his shoulders. She braced an arm along a towel bar and bit her lip hard as his tongue unraveled her, every press of lips or graze of teeth or lap of his tongue sending sparks down Sif's limbs. She shuddered and twitched, heels ground against his back, bucking helplessly against him until he clamped hands in a vise grip around her hips, fingers tight enough to bruise.

"Loki," she finally could not bother to hold the moan in any longer, "Loki, please--." Her hand tightened in his hair, pulling cruelly as his work wound her ever tighter. Unlike before every sound she made now seemed to urge him on until she was sure she must fly apart at any second. She arched and twisted, seeking that final push off the edge, and found it in a well-timed curl of his tongue. Sif held in a shout but ripped the towel bar from the wall with a crack and a thunderous clatter followed by the house-shaking thud of her landing and Loki's hasty dodge, neither of them swift enough in that moment to manage anything like grace in the slippery shower.

Stunned twice over Sif lay in the bottom of the tub in a tangle of limbs, dwindling hot water pattering down on them both, as Thor pounded up the stairs. "Sif?" he called from just outside the door, confusion and concern in equal measure in his voice, "Are you well? What was that?"

Sif's mouth dropped open to answer but instead out came first nothing and then a burst of laughter, the helplessly giggling sort she buried in Loki's chest but could not quite cease long enough to answer. Loki watched her for a moment and rolled his eyes, giving her head a playful shove before calling back, "She is uninjured, Thor. There was a slight mishap with some sort of--- towel rack."

"Ah. I see." Thor's reply was delayed a second by awkwardness (even after so many years he still preferred not to have to confront quite so directly the idea of his little brother and his best friend fucking) and his tone was sheepish but amused despite it as he said, "My apologies for having interrupted. Please don't trouble yourselves over fixing it. Just, ah. Be careful." There came an indistinguishable shout from downstairs and Thor added, "And Jane asks that you please do not use up all the hot water as she--," he coughed a laugh and relayed, "As she and I may require it later."

This did nothing to soothe Sif's brief bout of hysteria and Loki snorted, replying, "Very well."

Thor wandered off again chuckling to himself and Sif lifted her head, still sniggering into Loki's shoulder as she looked at him. She reached up to comb fingers through his hair and drew him down for a kiss, lazy and lingering, affection and thanks conveyed without a word. She slid into his lap without breaking contact, and with a soft noise but no preamble sank down onto him, still hard despite the distractions of the last few minutes. Sif wrapped arms around his shoulders and rode him with quick rolls of her hips, muscles still fluttering and so tightly around his cock it seemed like no time at all before he shuddered and groaned into her breast. Sif gave herself a few quick touches and followed suit, face pressed into his hair.

She caught her breath with her cheek against dark locks, petting his neck and shoulders as he stilled. They remained that way, breathing softly, twined together, until Sif finally forced her eyes back open and lifted a hand to wipe droplets from her brows. "We should save some water for them," she said quietly, "Since they asked," and Loki made a noise of protest but did not resist as they eased apart.

They washed quickly and toweled off, wandering hands more gentle than provocatory. Then dressed, Loki quickly combing and plaiting Sif's hair with nimble fingers as she fiddled with bra fastening and buttoned up her shirt. She turned back to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth as she rolled up her sleeves, and another once she'd found her sweater, careful not to lean against his still-damp skin as she pressed her smile to his lips. "I must go help Jane. Don't spend _too_ long combing your hair." She ruffled it as she drew back, and grinned.

"Wench," Loki replied, giving her a swat out the door, but he watched her go, smile still warm when he turned back to the mirror.

 

* * *

 

Downstairs, Jane was already at work in the kitchen and Sif sidled up to the counter, leaning a hip against the edge and watching as she rolled dough out onto the surface. The warrior tapped a thumb silently on the edge for an awkward moment until Jane looked up and arched a brow at her.

"I apologize for the damage to your bath," Sif said, as solemnly as she could, "It is a terrible way to repay your hospitality and we will see that it is restored as soon as can be."

Jane managed to stare her down for a whole two seconds before she gave in to laughing and waved a floury hand at her. "It's okay, really, it's not a big deal. We'll just get it fixed."

Sif looked relieved, her smile still turned up sheepishly. "I am glad. And sorry, truly. It was a foolish accident."

"Trust me, I'm more than familiar," Jane replied, "Thor snapped the entire headboard of my bed clean off once."

That pulled a surprised laugh out of Sif, and then a thoughtful sort of tilt to her head, eyes fixed on the ceiling just for a second as she considered.

Jane chuckled again and bumped her with an elbow. "Hey."

"What? Oh! No, not-- not you. I was--." Sif snorted and shrugged, "I _was_ considering the scenario, but with us."

"I figured. The way you two've been looking at each other all day I'm surprised I have any furniture left."

"What?" Sif actually reddened, the slightest hint of a flush stealing across her cheekbones. "Surely we have not been so obvious?"

"Any time you're in the same room for more than a minute and not completely distracted by something else you start looking like you're going to unhinge your jaws and eat each other alive."

Sif barked a laugh at that and scrubbed at a cheek. "I had not realized. I apologize. It has been-- a very long Yule, this year. And I was in Vanaheim before, and…." She gestured the 'and so on'.

Jane just smiled, brushing her hands clean and reaching for a bag of tin cut-outs, picking out star shapes to press into the dough, "I'm just teasing, Sif, you're really fine. I totally understand. I remember how long Yule can be, and I even had the excuse of needing to sleep ever. Just be more careful next time, okay? Especially with the bed in your room, it's an antique." Something about that made her pause a moment and laugh under her breath.

"We will, I promise you." Sif flashed Jane a bright smile and rubbed her hands together. "Right, how can I best assist you here?"

"Awesome. We're going to put down some flour, and give you a hunk of dough, and a rolling pin, annnnd…." Laughing as Sif tested the heft of the rolling pin in the air like a club, Jane set about demonstrating.

 

* * *

 

Later, after mountains of frozen pizza had been consumed and the children all tucked into bed (though not before Fríða and Ullr had roped them into a four-part reading of 'Twas The Night Before Christmas), the adults set about filling stockings and arranging presents beneath the tree. It was a huge fir, almost too big for the space, and apparently had already been drastically trimmed from its original size. ("I liked it," Thor had shrugged, not exactly remorseful, "It was a fine tree! It is the ceiling that is the problem.") Loki finished piling gifts beneath it in deceptively careful heaps spread around the base, one last package swapped out with another so it didn't sit too close to a third with the same wrapping paper. He pushed himself back to sit against the couch beside Sif, busy packing small items into stockings.

Thor whistled a song from the movie they'd watched after dinner as he and Jane put the finishing touches on their own presents, and Loki rolled his eyes at his brother. "Must you?"

Sif elbowed him lightly in the ribs. "Don't be such a Scrooge. Did you learn nothing from the story?"

"I learned I should beware of blue creatures with strange noses and rodent friends, as they possess uncanny powers of perception."

Sif snorted and the others laughed. Thor carefully set down the last gift and stepped up behind Jane to poke at the fire as she carefully hung stockings, setting one large hand on the small of her back. She smiled up at him, tucked the handle of a magnifying glass a little deeper, and stepped back, leaning into Thor's side. "We will bid you good night," he said, and Jane gave a little wave, "Unless there's anything else you need before we go?"

"No, please. I am nearly finished, and you have done more than enough," Sif assured them with a smile, "A good eve to you both."

"Indeed. Good night," Loki added.

Thor and Jane both smiled again, warmly as ever, and headed up the stairs. Once they were alone, Loki settled back against the couch again, draping an arm about Sif's shoulders. She watched him out the corner of her eye, the sharp angles of his face made only more dramatic in flickering firelight. He looked unsettled, some faint shadow in his gaze that wasn't just the room's natural dim. Sif leaned her knee and shoulder into his and handed him two small boxes that rattled loudly. "For Ullr," she explained, "Building sets. Which do you think he would prefer?"

Loki stared at them as if he wasn't sure how'd they'd come to be in his hands and then shook one and passed it back. "This one looks more complex. Give him that." After a brief pause he shook his head and waved a hand over them, "Give him both. We have no need to scrimp."

Sif nodded, working to fit both into the stocking, and then the last few baubles on top. She rose, and hung them before the hearth with the others, watching for a moment before joining Loki on the couch where he had relocated. He continued to stare into the flames as she settled at his side, curling up beneath his arm. They sat that way a while before she set a hand on his chest. "You are not truly like the man Scrooge in the movie, you know."

Loki was silent a moment, but lifted his own hand to cover hers, twining their fingers and removing them to his leg. "Perhaps no longer," he said, "But neither am I the Scrooge at the end. Nor am I ever likely to be."

"It is true I cannot picture you singing in the streets or to a table full of strangers and farm animals."

Loki snorted softly, mood unlightened by her jest. Sif turned a little more towards him, setting legs across his lap and drawing nearer. "You are a good father," she said, touching his jaw, "And a good husband. And a good king. That you could be better still does not mean you have not come far."

"There are many who might say of me what is said of that man after his death," he replied, gaze fixed on the fireplace, his fingers restless between Sif's, picking at the fabric of her jeans, "That the warmth that lingers in my blankets is the only warmth I have ever had. And I am cooler than most in that regard as well."

"Those who say such things do not know you." Sif stilled his fidgeting with a squeeze. "Not as your family does. It is not your heart that is the problem, it is how rarely you allow it to be seen." She rubbed a thumb across his knuckles in soothing stroke. "It was always moods like this one, born of your own mind, that caused you trouble." She leaned closer to press a kiss to his cheek and lean her forehead against his temple a moment. "You tell yourself you will never be believed anything but bad, and so why should you strive to be other than a villain. But you are wrong, and I will remind you that you are wrong as many times as I must. I know the best of you and I shall never let you accept anything less."

Loki's jaw worked, brow furrowed and lips pursed as he swallowed, some impulse to snap back at her, to call her wrong and prove it, rising as it always did. He waited it out, gaze fixed on his hand where it was tangled with his wife's. "When I wed a warrior I assumed I had safely avoided a lifetime of tidy little speeches," he said, tone dry, and Sif pinched his thigh hard.

"Tidy it might have been, but I mean what I say and you know it," she replied when he rubbed at the spot and shot her an aggrieved look.

Loki sighed and flopped against the couch back, freeing his hand to rub briskly at his face.

Sif heaved a breath as well and sat back with him, encouraged that he rested his arms across her legs instead of avoiding contact. "The point of the story was that even near the end of a life, redemption was still possible. How you missed that I am not sure, it was plain enough and we both know I am not the scholar in this family."

"Sif...."

"Loki."

They looked at each other for a moment, and then he rolled his eyes and gathered her closer, tucking his head against the top of hers.

"I am not entirely sure what you are unhappy about," she admitted, smoothing his shirt across his chest.

"Neither am I," Loki grumbled against her hair, and Sif laughed softly.

"Then let it go, and be glad for what we have. You need not sing duets with horses to make anyone love you. Though I suspect your daughter would be beside herself with glee if you did choose to."

Sif was rewarded with a snort of laughter at that, and the press of Loki's lips to her hairline. "No doubt. For her I might even consider it."

"I know." She picked at her cuff, tugging it down over her knuckles. "I am sorry for earlier, about the snowballs. I know you would never risk the children being hurt."

"Wouldn't I?" was a sour bit of snark Sif didn't dignify with an answer beyond a steady look. Loki didn't precisely ease beneath it but rubbed at his arm and settled them across his chest. "I did consider it, to be truthful. When he told me about the ambassadors' children picking on him."

"I am glad you did not, though I cannot say I would altogether mind him giving a few of them black eyes."

"Good, because I told him that you would teach him how to take down the bigger ones should they gang up on him again."

Sif laughed, "You didn't! Loki! Oh, very well, of course I will. I wish we could send to Vanaheim for a new ambassador just because his children are terrible little bilgesnipes."

"You know that is what all the ambassadors thought of us as children?"

"Yes, well. We grew out of it. Mostly."

"Some of us."

Sif could feel the sideways look teasing in his tone, and laughed, reaching for his arm as if she might pinch him again. He batted her hand down and wrapped his arm around her instead and she settled close, falling into an easy silence. They sat that way until the fire guttered out and Sif breathed soft and slowly against Loki's shoulder, and he gathered her up and climbed the stairs to bed.

 

* * *

 

Sif was woken by small voices and smaller fingers, both poking at her insistently. "Momma," they whispered. There was a grunt and then a hand patting at her face, "Pssssssssst! Momma! Momma, wake up!"

Sif cracked open one eye a tiny slit, just enough to see the heads of both her children not a foot away and then get smacked by Sigrún's hand flailing more insistently at her cheek. Ullr staggered under the weight of holding his little sister up to the edge of the bed as gravity slowly pulled her from his grip around her middle. "Sigrún!" he hissed, "You gotta climb up! You're too heavy!"

"It's too high!"

"No it's not, you can do it, just reach! Reach and I'll lift you."

Though poised to intervene if necessary Sif also struggled to hold in a grin as her daughter clawed her way up onto the bed while her son heaved, red-faced and determined. Behind her, Loki rolled over and slid near, an arm slipped around her waist beneath the blankets and his breath warm on the nape of her neck. "Should we allow them to continue?" he murmured, and she made a tiny noise and minute nod of assent before they both resumed "sleeping".

"Momma! Father!" Sigrún bounced and wobbled between them as she made it to her feet on the springy mattress, leaning heavily on Sif as she climbed over her legs.

Ullr climbed up behind her, bouncing on his knees. "Shh!" he tried, a token effort as patience waned. He found one of Loki's feet and gave it a shake. "Father! Wake uuuup!"

"Wake up! Wake up wake up wake up!" Sigrún hopped up and down, giggling when she tumbled onto the blankets, "Wake up wake up!"

"It's Christmas!" Ullr's jumping shook the bed when he joined in, "Wake up for Christmas! Uncle Thor says you have to!"

Sif made a loud snoring noise that turned abruptly into a snort of barely-contained laughter as Loki pinched her hip.

"You're awake!" their son dropped onto his knees and pointed accusingly, "You're awake! I can tell! I see you smirking Momma! Get up, get up! Uncle Thor says we can't go down and see what Santa Claus left for us until everyone's up and everyone's up but you!"

"Everyone but you!" Sigrún echoed, drumming on Loki's side with both palms.

"Very well! Very well! I'm awake!" he said, lifting a hand and his head, twisting away from Sif to sit up. She did the same, smiling as Ullr crowed in triumph,

"I knew it! I knew you were faking! I can always tell when you're faking, Momma."

He went back to bouncing, the bed frame rattling against the wall until Loki reached out and snagged him out of the air, dragging him down and tickling his sides, "Stop. That. Jumping!" he demanded through Ullr's peals of laughter. One of his feet caught Sif hard in the side and she scooped Sigrún up out of the danger zone, only to find herself the subject of a tickle sneak attack.

"Noooooo! Loki, I have been ambushed again!" Sif fell back beneath Sigrún's efforts, "I love you all! Tell the children!" She flopped over half onto her still-giggling daughter, playing dead for half a second before blowing a raspberry on her belly and then gathering the girl into her lap, planting a kiss on the top of her dark head.

"I don't know, Loki, I feel as if I might sleep a while longer, myself. Only a day or tw-- what is _that_?"

A great racket came very suddenly from downstairs, a scratching noise and then music that blasted up through the floor, drowning out the childrens' groans of dismay with a jaunty fiddling tune and a half-dozen voices at least raised in incomprehensible song.

Ullr settled on his knees between them but only just, still bouncing a little. "We should go find out! Downstairs!"

"NOW ARE YOU AWAKE?" Thor shouted up from below, and Ullr yelled back, accompanied by Sigrún in stereo: "THEY ARE! THEY'RE AWAKE! BUT THEY DON'T WANT TO GET UP!"

Thor's laugh carried easily even over the music, and footsteps pounded down the hall, Fríða running in to lean on the corner of the bed, hanging off the post, "Oh, please get up! We want to do stockings! Please, Aunt Sif? Uncle Loki?"

Loki looked at the three sets of big, pleading eyes turned on him, green and hazel and blue. "Wellllllll," he said, dragging it out until the children looked like they might burst, "I suppose we should." There was a renewed round of shouting and bouncing as the children cheered and climbed down and raced to the top of the stairs, while Loki looked over at Sif at his side, a grin twitching at her lips.

"Good morning," he said.

"I love you," she replied.

 

* * *

 

Stockings took most of the morning, Fríða instructing Sigrún how to just take one thing out at a time instead of dumping the whole lot onto the floor, Ullr getting distracted wanting to thoroughly examine each item before moving onto the next, Jón gumming at a toy's ear and burbling happily, the adults laughing and helping and oohing and ahhing, all while Thor carefully worked the tiny buttons on Jane's camera to film most of the proceedings. Later after coffee cake and a while for regrouping (and more careful showers) they all sat down again before the tree and covered the room in bits of wrapping paper and ribbons. Then the children were left to roll about like tiny Scrooge McDucks in their piles of new toys while Jane set the rest of them to work. Loki peeled while Sif chopped and Thor helped dress the turkey, all three Asgardians sharing a look when they for a moment found themselves alone in the kitchen, working away. "We have had many adventures, but I can safely say this is one I could never have anticipated," Sif remarked, and they all grinned.

When dinner was safely under way, Jane sent Thor out to begin gathering up wood for the bonfire, and after a few minutes he stuck his head back in to grab up some gloves and call, "Loki! Brother! Lend me a hand, or we shall never be finished before dark or mealtime."

Loki made a grumbling noise beneath his breath, and Sif studiously kept her head down, offering no out. He very obviously considered saying no anyway, but after a moment rolled his eyes and set down his book. "Very well, if I must."

Outside, the two sons of Odin tromped through the snow as the sun sank lower, gathering up heaps of brush and limbs brought down by ice, dragging them into a growing heap on the lake's edge. At first Loki deliberately avoided arriving to toss in his armload of kindling at the same moment as Thor, but after a while he gave it up and their trips took up a sort of synchronization.

They worked in a companionable silence and it was such a welcome surprise to Loki - who had feared this was some sort of trap for a lecture - that when Thor stacked branches into a pyramid and abruptly said, "Brother there is a favor I would ask you," his first reaction was not anger but disappointment.

Which did not keep the wariness from his tone when he replied, "What sort of favor?"

Thor chuckled, lifting a hand but letting it drop again. "It is nothing onerous, I do not think. I merely seek advice." He pushed big hands into the pockets of his coat, elbows swung out wide exaggerating his shrug. "Fríða was a very easy babe, she slept like a log from the start. But Jon is not and Jane and I have run short of ideas. I seem to recall that Ullr gave you and Sif similar trouble for a time until you mastered it somehow, and I thought perhaps you might share with me your secrets."

Loki finished placing the brush he'd gathered and arranged with unnecessary care, and then stood surveying it a moment in silence as he wiped his gloves clean against each other. Thor waited with slightly anxious patience, rocking forward from heels to toes and back, snow crunching beneath his weight.

"It is not so much of a secret," Loki said finally, the modesty sat a little awkwardly on his shoulders as he turned to shrug back at his brother, "But, of course. This evening, perhaps, I can show you what worked with Ullr."

"Excellent!" Thor's grin split his face and he clapped a heavy hand on Loki's shoulder. The leaner brother winced beneath its weight more out of habit than actual discomfort, and after a moment let himself return the smile, though it remained directed at their handiwork before them for all of its brief lifespan.

"In fact there is a matter on which your assistance would be of benefit as well," Loki said after a long moment, leaning forward to adjust the pitch of the pile. He snapped twigs off a larger piece of wood and tossed them into the center. "Relations with Nidavellir have warmed but the re-negotiation of our contracts with their craftsmen is on-going. There are some who think the process might benefit from your voice on the council, particularly as it concerns the special weaponry we have requested."

Thor stepped towards the heap to do some rearranging of his own, the better to keep a studious look upon his face and the smile out of his tone. "I see," he said, a little too gravely, and Loki cut a look his way across the pile, on the lookout as ever for any sign of mockery. He found no definitive signs but let his reply turn acid all the same, "If you can deign to spare the time from your precious mortal companions, of course."

Thor refused to rise to the half-hearted bait, picking his head up to turn a benign smile on his brother. "Of course, Loki. I am always at Asgard's disposal. If you believe I may be of help then I am honored to be called upon. Just name the time and place and I shall be there."

Loki again searched for some tinge of disdain in Thor's response, but even with his gimlet eye could find naught but what he'd said aloud. "...Good," he said finally, "I will send a messenger when the meeting has been set." He picked at a spot of sap on the fingertip of one glove and added, tone somewhat officious but lack that imperious cold that lay beneath it so often, "There may be other matters on which your input would be of benefit to the crown as well. You should plan to remain some days when you come. Likely you will not be needed long at all, but it is possible things may arise."

Thor just smiled still, and nodded. "I look forward to it." He clapped a fist to his heart, and might have said something else but Jane leaned out a window to call, "Thor! Get in here!" and as if on cue the wind picked up, clouds swirling together overhead, coalescing to lance a beam of light onto the gravel road up the hill. "Oh!" Thor chuckled to himself and showed Loki a smile too excited to rightly be called chagrined. "I may have invited a few additional guests. As a surprise! Come!" He thumped Loki's shoulder again and jogged for the house, and after a moment and a sigh his brother walked briskly after.

 

* * *

 

Within a few minutes the house seemed full to bursting, and Thor's infuriating calm as Jane hissed at him about how he _should have told her so they could have made enough food for everyone!!!_ was vindicated. The Warriors Three arrived laden down with covered dishes, Volstagg alone bearing a massive ham and a venison roast, which he were not just for him. He'd brought two of his children along and they too had bowls to set on the table before darting off to play with their cousins.

Hogun and Fandral confessed they had no idea what dishes they carried and were immediately distracted anyway, leaving Volstagg to list off the array of contributions while the other two happily related the tale of their latest adventure to the children, complete with voices (by Fandral) and shadow-puppets (by Hogun). Erik arrived with a pot full of Swedish meatballs, and Darcy brought along a huge stack of admittedly store-bought pies and a Steve Rogers to carry them. Finally there was Heimdall, letting himself in quietly with jugs of mulled wine and mead he barely managed to set down before his sister had tackled him in a hug.

Thor went to work adding leaves to the dining room table but even so it did not seem they would ever all fit, and there was talk of adding a second in another room, but Loki insisted it would be fine and they should all just leave it be and eat already before Volstagg expired. Sure enough when they sat somehow a table built for twelve sat sixteen and a high chair with ease.

"We are so very glad to have you all with us today," Thor said from the head of the table, and Jane nodded.

"Really, it's an amazing present, thank you all so much for coming. It's awesome to have everyone here, and…" she laughed, and shrugged, and summed up with a lift of her glass, "Merry Christmas!"

"Merry Christmas!" everyone echoed the toast, and as they drank Sif reached beneath the table to take her husband's hand, finding it in mid-air between them, coming her way with the same thought in mind.

"Merry Christmas," she said quietly, tangling her fingers with his.

Loki rolled his eyes as always, but Sif saw the playful glint in them this time and the easy way this smile, discreet as it was, lit his face. He squeezed her hand, "Merry Christmas."


End file.
